Parting Glances
The magic two-way mirror that Alice passed through long ago – recounted by Lewis Carroll in his story of wrong-sided wonderment, "Alice Through The Looking Glass" – sold recently on e-Bay.
Alice's mirror went for five times the Mother Teresa cinnamon scone face; seven times the Elvis Presley's barber clippings; three times more than Queen Victoria's sized XXL monogrammed cotton bloomers.
High bidders were Big Apple Tradeoffs, a coalition of gay investors who claimed – perhaps more in jest than actual proof – they were descendants of the Red Queen of "Off with their heads!" fame.
They said their crimson ancestor once owned the mirror, amusing herself by pushing through its transparent surface anyone who annoyed her during Wimbledom croquet matches by cheating with steroid pumped, pink lawn flamingos.
("It's much more fun than lopping off heads or banishing the flummoxed creatures into exile," chortled the Red Queen, one Whitsome Sunday to the stone deaf Archbishop of Canterbury.)
The mansion on the outskirts of Dale-in-the-Dinkleberry, London, that housed the mirror for decades, among many other quaint and randomly self-rearranging objet d'arts, was razed two years ago (after a rather notorious drag ball featured a red-faced streaking prince).
Fittingly, Alice's mirror floated across the Atlantic on the QE ll, arriving in harbor without fracture, fanfare, or publicity – 'tho someone who name-tagged himself The Mad Hatter kept pestering returning Olympic Swim Team members to join him for aromatic teas and Alice B. Toklas crumpets.
Investors who met the arriving luxury ship at dockside – waving rainbow flags and blowing tin hornies – planned to take the mirror for a festive, and, to be sure, money making unveiling at Fire Island.
It occurred out of the blue (as past tense things do with gay men) that no one had given the mirror a trial run. No one had a clue as to what, if anything, might lie in wait on its other side. (How trustworthy was Carroll who liked to photograph little girls naked?)
Unfortunately, not one of the investors wanted to volunteer. They pondered long and hard, deciding to opt out for Happy Hour, leaving the mirror temporarily unattended. And so it came to pass that a muscle-bound gym buff cruising by got curiouser and curiouser.
Enchanted with what he saw reflected, he looked both ways, then lovingly kissed his suntanned image. And, just as suddenly, he got sucked across. And stuck.
As the investors drank themselves silly, others passed by the mirror. They too quickly found themselves suctioned in. There was a acolyte-diddling priest. Six Log Cabin Republicans. A TV evangelist out highjacking sinners. A drag queen who nonstop lip-synced 500 Madonna songs. And, a wide-stance politician whose career got stalled.
Over the next few days, little by little, it became apparent to the Tradeoffs, now stone sober, that the mirror was willy-nilly nabbing and nobody was returning. A bad investment, the investors agreed.
Moral: If you fall in love with your own image while passing a two-way magic mirror while assuming no one's looking, don't be surprised if you get sucked into a no-brainer otherside that's not quite PC. Better still, don't vote Republican. You won't escape alive.)
